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“We’re not going to talk about you,” Regan assured her with a half smile.
Kylie couldn’t quite erase the “yeah, sure” look from her face.
Regan stepped out into the hall, pulling the door shut behind her, and met Will at the glass entryway a few feet from her room.
“Are you trying to keep me from buying a horse?” she asked without bothering to say hello.
Will tilted his black hat back, allowing her to see his eyes without the shadow of the brim. And they were nice eyes—not Kylie’s deep brown, but blue-gray.
“That would be rather presumptuous of me.”
Regan let out a snort. “Yes. I agree.”
“Been talking to Kylie?”
“Yes.”
Will’s gaze shifted to the door of the room behind her. He paused before he brought his attention back to Regan.
“I am not trying to keep you from buying a horse. I am trying to keep you from making a mistake.”
Incredible. “And who are you to decide whether or not I’m making a mistake?”
“I know the horses in this community. But more than that, I know the people selling them.” His expression was impassive. “I know a mistake when I see one.”
Regan narrowed her eyes. “And just why do you know so much?”
“Because I’m a deputy brand inspector. If it has four legs and eats hay, I’m probably involved in the sale.” His eyes went back to the door. “Do you think I could have my daughter?”
Regan didn’t budge. “Why was Broomtail a mistake?”
“She’s a very unpleasant mare most of the time.”
“Most of the time? But she seemed…” Regan’s voice trailed off as several aspects of her experience with Broomtail began to make more sense—the mare’s lethargic attitude, followed by a display of impatience. Charley glancing anxiously at his watch.…
Will saw that she’d caught his meaning.
“He gives her enough tranquilizer to make her less cranky and more salable. We had a chat the other night. I don’t think he’ll be doing it again in the near future.” He gestured to the classroom. “My daughter?”
Regan moved to her door and pulled it open, her mind still working over the Broom-tail issue. Kylie stumbled out a bit too fast, but the brand inspector didn’t seem surprised by his daughter’s sudden appearance.
“Let’s go,” he said. He met Regan’s eyes for a brief moment as he pushed the glass door open. Kylie slipped out under his hand and Will followed, letting the door swing shut behind him.
Regan gave her head a slow shake. It sounded as if Kylie was right. Her dad had rescued her.
“WERE YOU EAVESDROPPING on us?” Will asked as he put the truck in gear.
“I couldn’t hear through the door.
“I’ll take that to be a yes.”
“Dad,” Kylie said seriously. “I like to know what’s going on, if it concerns me.”
“It didn’t concern you.”
“Yeah. I figured.”
“How?”
“You guys didn’t even look at me when I went by.”
Will told her to knock off the eavesdropping, but he was impressed. His kid was observant, which was why she was good with horses. She could read cues. It was a valuable skill, one she seemed to be more talented at applying to people than he was. A bit of her mother coming through there.
“Something wrong, Dad?”
Will shook his head, keeping his eyes on the road.
“What are we eating tonight?”
He gave the standard answer. “Beef…”
“It’s what’s for dinner.” They spoke in unison, mimicking an old ad slogan from the Beef Council.
One of these days she’d probably grow tired of the games and routines they’d started when she was younger, but he still had a few years left. He hoped. Kids seem to grow up so fast.
“Anything else?”
“No,” he said facetiously. “Just beef.”
“Good. I was tired of vegetables, anyway.”
“How was school?”
“You didn’t hear from anyone, did you?” It would have been funny, if she hadn’t been serious.
“No.”
“Then it was fine.”
“Kylie.”
She grinned. “Gotcha.”
He rolled his eyes, wondering if he was ready for the approaching teenage years. Somehow he didn’t think so. He was still debating how to handle certain matters that would have to be cropping up soon. He wasn’t squeamish about girls’ growth issues, just uninformed. Okay, maybe he was a little squeamish. He was hoping he could get Beth Grant, Kylie’s best friend’s mom, to help with that part of Kylie’s upbringing. It wasn’t exactly fair, but neither was growing up without a mother. Father and daughter both had to do the best they could.
He pulled to a stop in front of the house and reached over the back of the seat for the bag of groceries.
“I see carrots.”
“There’s worse stuff below that. Spinach, beets, spuds and corn.”
“I liked the just-beef plan better.”
“I’m sure you did, but veggies are a fact of life.”
A STORM WAS MOVING IN. A full moon was in the offing. In Regan’s experience, those were usually the best explanations for the off-the-wall behavior of her classes on such a day.
Jared, the new guy, Pete’s long-term PE sub, stood in the hall with her. “I’m whipped,” he said. “I usually teach elementary. Now I know why.”
“This age grows on you.”
“When?”
Regan smiled at his comeback and he returned the smile crookedly. The bell rang and Jared exhaled and headed for his class.
Regan managed to keep a lid on things until sixth period, near the end of the day. Kylie’s class. Regan was teaching observation skills and since kids love nothing better than something gross and slimy, she’d invested in several calamari. The lesson was good—she’d simply picked the wrong day to teach it.
The trouble started as soon as the students were released to start their lab.
“Hey, Sadie,” one of the boys called, holding up his squid. “Doesn’t this look a lot like a spider?”
The girl immediately turned pale and stared straight down at the table. The boy wiggled the squid and a few students laughed, until they saw the look of death in Regan’s eyes. It had been a long day and she was not going to put up with this. She walked over to the offending student, took his books, led him to a desk and told him to read chapter two of his textbook, outline it and then answer all questions at the end.
She moved back to Sadie, who was still staring down at the floor with Kylie beside her, and discovered that the girl did indeed have a major fear of spiders. Regan assured her that the squid was not a spider and that she could observe it from a comfortable distance. “No one will bother you.”
A quick look around the class told her that everyone had gotten her message—or so she’d thought—until the students filed out after the quietest lab of the day and she realized that one of her specimens was missing.
She didn’t need it—her final class was social studies—but she couldn’t have an unauthorized squid floating around the school. She hated to think of what might happen if it fell into the wrong hands. She had to find that cephalopod.
Then a shriek in the hall gave her a good of idea of where to look. She hurried to the door and pushed her way through a throng of kids to see three people in the center of the hall—Pete Domingo, Sadie and Kylie. The missing squid lay on the floor near Pete’s feet.
“Pick it up.” He was talking to Sadie.
Sadie’s face was ashen. She shook her head, looking as if she was about to be sick. Domingo’s face grew red.
“I. Said. Pick. It. Up.”
The girl was close to tears. She didn’t move.
“Joseph threw it at Sadie. So Joseph should pick it up.” Kylie said hotly. Sadie was Kylie’s best friend and Kylie was bent on protecting her.
“I distinctly saw it in Miss Grant’s hand just before it hit me in the face.”
“I was just getting it off me.” The girl’s voice was shaky. Her entire body was trembling, but Pete didn’t seem aware of that. He’d just been hit in the face with a squid. The world was about to end.
“I’ll pick it up,” Kylie snapped. She started to reach for it, but Pete stopped her.
That was when Regan stepped into the center of the circle, calmly stooped down and grabbed the slimy creature. “I was wondering where this had gotten to,” she said evenly, looking Pete in the eye. “I’m glad you found it.” She turned and the crowd parted as she walked back to her room.
There was a silence and then— “Anyone who is not in class when that bell rings will have three days’ detention.”
The crowd broke up, leaving Kylie and Sadie standing silently in the center of the hall, uncertain whether they were supposed to go or stay. The bell rang and Regan paused at her door to see what was going to happen.
Domingo shook his head. “Three days, ladies.”
His voice was clearly audible in Regan’s classroom. She let out a breath and, knowing the kids were watching her reaction, carefully kept her face expressionless as she walked to the front of the class and started taking attendance. Inwardly she was seething.
Tanya was right. A baboon would be better.
CHAPTER TWO
“DAD, do you think you’ll ever get married again?”
Will managed to flip the hotcake he was cooking without muffing it. “Not anytime soon.”
“Good.”
“Why?”
“Mark’s dad and stepmom are breaking up. He says it sucks.”
It did suck. No argument there. “Marriage is serious business, Kylie. Not something to be entered into lightly.”
“How about you and my mother?”
My mother. The shadow figure. Kylie rarely spoke of her, although she did keep a photo of her in her hope chest. The last Will had heard, Des had hooked up with a rodeo stock contractor and was living in Florida. He hoped she’d finally matured enough to try to stick it out in a relationship.
“We were young.”
Kylie speared a hotcake off the plate her father had set in the middle of the table. “That matters?”
“A lot of times it does. You can’t have a grown-up relationship if you’re not grown up.”
“Marriage must be a lot of work.”
“A good one is,” Will said as he poured more batter into the pan.
“Then how do parents have time for kids?”
Will didn’t know, since he’d never had a wife and a child at the same time. He winged it. “They work together to raise the kids.”
“How do they have time for each other?” Kylie slathered butter on the hotcake and started to eat, not bothering with syrup.
“They make time.”
“Mark’s parents didn’t.”
“How so?”
